


Taking the Bullet

by Marzipan77



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Episode: s02e04 Meat, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-04
Updated: 2013-08-04
Packaged: 2017-12-28 11:56:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/991732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marzipan77/pseuds/Marzipan77
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some wounds are shallow, some deep; Ianto’s grown used to taking the bullets.  But when a psychic connection with a tortured creature leaves him empty, Ianto realizes he has nothing to lose.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“You love him – it makes you vulnerable.”  
  
Teeth grinding, Ianto burned, denying the ache, Jack’s words that clenched into fists and broke his skin over and over again. It was all Rhys and Gwen – and Jack, of course. The legendary triangle. All want and need, longing looks and dramatic pining. Sweeping romance that belonged in swashbuckling regency era bodice rippers where the plucky heroine finally turns from her staid, bland, milk-toast boyfriend to save the poor, lonely hero from his life of sin.

It made Ianto ill, reached inside and cored him out like an apple. And the low-grade headache that had plagued him for weeks didn’t help. His skin twitched and prickled every time Gwen or Jack’s ‘long, meaningful’ glances brushed against him.

But he smiled and nodded and took orders, steadied himself in the back of Rhys’ van without meeting any of their eyes. He’d swept through the doors of the warehouse in Owen’s wake, the stench of death almost a welcome relief, an obvious excuse for his roiling stomach and doubled vision. He jerked backwards when the haunting scent of skin, of Jack, spread through the air around him, and a trail of warmth on his side seemed to echo certain elegant fingers.

‘Stop it,’ he warned himself. Jack was not at his side, had not turned his attention towards Ianto in weeks. The kiss they’d shared, the talk of love, just another vapor that had vanished into the past as had Tommy Brockless

Owen’s warning was not much of a surprise. “Everyone – they’re armed.” Of course they were. Men who were capable of tearing apart a living being for meat would be. Hadn’t Jack and the others learned that out in the bloody countryside a year ago? Or was killing and eating humans somehow more disgusting, more horrible, than carving up still-alive aliens and selling their meat to the abattoir? Ianto didn’t see how.

Ianto flew down the steps, feet barely touching. Stun the ‘not hardened criminals’ and set the creature free. Right. It sounded good in the hub, in the clean, calm conference room when the creature’s screams only sounded in the back of Ianto’s mind and didn’t reverberate from every surface all around them. When his teeth were only set on-edge by the smell of Jack’s testosterone-laden posturing for Gwen’s benefit, not when he was facing a crowd of armed gits who wouldn’t think twice about blowing Ianto’s head off.

The door slammed open behind him and he turned. “Hello!” A smile, a wave, a distraction and he’d stunned the man and dragged him away down the hallway. Ianto was excellent at distraction, he smiled to himself. He could – and did - do it in his sleep.

“Ianto, did Rhys get away?”

He wiped his hands on his coat and took a deep breath. Wasn’t Rhys’ fault, he reminded himself. Poor bloke had no idea his fiancée and Captain Jack were all but in bed together. Even while Ianto himself was the warm body the captain happened to be fucking while he thought longingly of long hair and tits.

Ianto touched his communicator. “I’ll check now.” He hurried back through the hallways, awkwardly sidestepping the blood-soaked parcels hanging from the rafters. His legs felt heavy, wooden, the constant headache, nausea, and outright disgust that had plagued him for weeks had stolen Ianto’s sleep, his patience, and any hope of coordination.

Three. Three of them, Rhys held between them and a gun shoved in Ianto’s face. He forced himself to stillness, locking eyes with the nervous man who demanded answers, whose finger was curled around the trigger of the gun too tightly, Rhys’ bruised face and wide eyes in the background. ‘See only me,’ Ianto thought, insisted, demanded. ‘I am the threat, here.’

“How many more of you?”

He rolled his eyes. “Just us.”

“Oh, you thought the two of you could take us out?”

It was supposed to be the two of them – Ianto and Owen. Apparently someone – no names, but he wore a long greatcoat and couldn’t keep it in his pants - thought the two of them could handle the unarmed, ‘non-threatening’ men. His eyebrow flicked in disgust.

He knew the others could hear every word the man spewed at him when Owen’s whisper came over the comms: “They’ve got Rhys and Ianto.” Ianto swore he could hear Gwen’s wail and see Jack restraining her, the scene playing out behind his eyes. The man with the gun surged forward, startling Ianto from the persistent vision and grabbed him around the throat.

“Nice necktie – you the boss, then?” His fingers tightened, pulling Ianto close to his chest, the muzzle of his gun pressed to his temple. “So am I, yeah? We understand each other?”

Ianto narrowed his eyes, lips pressed closed. Apparently, that was answer enough.

The alien was huge, filling the warehouse end to end. Dark shades of mottled brown and grey danced along its ridged torso; the thing, the alien, smelled of sorrow and loneliness and Ianto nearly wept, staring, transfixed, his wrists tied roughly behind his back. The darkness in his own soul was eclipsed by the bright desperation of the lost, wounded creature.

It happened quickly – time and motion stretching, shrinking, Doppler shifts of color outlining each form. Ianto’s heartbeat, staccato and fast, thudded painfully hard in his chest. His eyes darted to stacked crates, his vision doubling to show his team, both hidden and revealed, from two perspectives.

Of course, Gwen showed herself first, her worry bouncing around between the metal walls. She was afraid for Rhys, fraught, reckless to protect him. She’d never let harm come to him if she could help it – not physical harm, anyway. As soon as her gun hit the floor, the butchers holding Rhys pushed him away, into Gwen’s arms, even as one shouted from above and pointed out Tosh and Jack’s position. Pain shot through Ianto’s shoulder as the self-proclaimed boss, Dale, grabbed him, pulling him backwards, the barrel of his gun cold against Ianto’s neck.

Jack was talking. Talking. Demanding that Dale and the others see, that they realize exactly what they’d been doing here. Murdering this being by inches to fill bellies and make a profit. Talking. The captain’s voice rang hollow, tasting of rust and ashes. Not the same – this was not the same man who broke down walls with a tractor and shot men and women full of holes to save him – to save them. Was this a better Jack? A more patient, more compassionate Jack Harkness? More humane? He’d insisted that this alien was worth saving, was worth as much as any other life. Was it because these bastards hadn’t killed it yet that he was wasting words on them instead of buckshot?

Ianto’s fingers cramped, cold and nerveless as he strained hard against the rough twine cutting into his wrists. They’d not tied him well – not as practiced as the previous cannibals who’d strung him up and tenderized him last year. Muscles bunched and cramped as if he’d been restrained for weeks instead of moments, panic rising in his throat, he fought to conceal his movements, to keep them small and subtle when he wanted to rage and scream. No gag kept him quiet this time, no jute sack over his head to easily hide his pain. Ianto squeezed his eyes shut as he fumbled with the bindings, thumb crooked, close to dislocating. The gun barrel shifted, jabbing just below his collarbone.

“It’s just meat, that’s all,” Dale shouted.

Just meat. The words echoed around Ianto’s head. Just meat – no life, no soul, no mercy. He wondered if Gwen would need to understand them this time, to sit down and ask deep questions before putting the butchers away. He felt a snap in his hand just as he managed to tug free the loop in the twine as the man clutching him ranted.

“This is my business.” The gun ground harder against bone with every word. “For the first time in my life I’ve actually got something for myself!”

Dale took a half step backward and Ianto felt the pressure against his chest ease, felt the tiny shift in the man’s stance, his decision made. The gun rose to point towards Gwen and Rhys and he tensed.

“You lied to me.”

Heat exploded next to Ianto’s face. Rhys thrust Gwen out of the way. Jack shouted. And Ianto lunged blindly for the gun, one second too late. He wrestled with Dale, able to grip with just one hand, forcing the barrel away from Jack and Tosh, away from his friends, as Dale pulled the trigger again and again.

The alien screamed jagged shards of glass into Ianto’s mind.

Pain surrounded him, breathed into his lungs, and choked his throat with bile. A fist connected with his kidneys, arching him backwards, Dale’s fingers stabbing into his jaw. He dropped the butcher to the floor, straddling him, one swift backhand knocking the man’s head to the side and sending a shock of pain up through his injured hand. Rage and loss and vengeance swept through Ianto, blurring his eyes, and then the gun slammed into his ribs, thrusting him sideways to curl against the floor, a familiar metal shape in his hand.

When he looked up Dale loomed over him, shaking hands wrapped around the pistol and a feral light in his eyes.

So small. Tiny. Looking down on the scene from far above, he saw himself, motionless against the cement floor, Dale, a stick figure leaning over him.

Pulling the trigger.

Click.

Click.

Nothing. Ianto blinked again and he was himself. And Dale was gone.

“Ianto! Go! After them!”

He struggled to his feet, mind blank, overloaded with images. The alien shrieked and writhed, broadcasting its pain in deafening, crushing waves. Sensations rolled red tides of pain over him - his, the creature’s - he couldn’t separate them, couldn’t breathe. Ianto was drowning.

Jack’s words finally registered and Ianto tore his gaze away from the alien to see the blood on Gwen’s hands, the narrow aisle between the huge thrashing body and his teammates. He spun on his heel and ran.

The first man fell to his stun-gun. “You’ve got to help them – it’s out of control.” He saw the determined light behind Owen’s eyes and left him to it.

Follow orders. He could follow orders. Jack had told him to go after them and he would. He kicked at the second door and took the man down, sending electricity surging through his gut, and turned just as Dale grabbed at another pistol. He heard the bones snap in the butcher’s arm where he kicked him; saw the terror and agony on Dale’s pale face.

Ianto shoved the stun-gun into Dale’s forehead, all of the boiling emotion, the turmoil and confusion, the raging fury tightening his throat. “Pray they survive,” he growled, pulling the trigger.

Stumbling back towards his team, Ianto felt the alien’s pain give way, felt the release as if a giant’s hand that had been clenched crushingly around his body suddenly let go. He fell to his knees, panting, head hanging.

“Ah, no,” he whispered, tears blinding him.

Hands fleetingly caressed his skin. Saying good-bye. Pleading for forgiveness.

It faded, slowly, pain giving way to acceptance, to peace, to emptiness. Ianto felt one last pulse of sadness, of a deep aching longing for home, and then he was alone within his mind, his own pain making itself known. Tremors shook through him, leaving him weak, but he lifted his chin and limped to his feet just as Owen and Gwen shuffled towards him supporting a bloodied Rhys.

“Here – Ianto – give us a hand.”

And, of course, he did.

oOo

Ianto had driven back to the hub in a daze, Rhys between Gwen and Owen in the back propped up with bandages and reassurances, and the world around him having leached back into reality bit by bit. One swift yank had righted his thumb, his own bruises easily forgotten, buried under the memory of the creature’s torture and pain. Arranging for the truck, disposing of the body, piece by piece, working silently alongside Jack, he’d allowed his mind to rest, his body to fall back into mechanical efficiency, his movements lighter, his thoughts clearer than they'd been in far too long. He didn’t want to think about how long he’d been connected to the wounded alien, or how, or why; why he had felt the alien creature's pain. He pulled back into quiet, understated Ianto Jones, invisible tea boy. Hidden. Invulnerable.

At the hub, Ianto stood at the rail, hands braced, his blood-soaked jacket abandoned somewhere between trips from the warehouse to the incinerator and back. Hours later his hands still shook, his muscles still trembled as the adrenaline and the remnants of the psychic connection drained away. Tosh stole glances at him, worried, he knew, about the things he’d let slip while they worked to remove every alien trace from the warehouse and the butchers’ minds. She suspected there was more to Ianto’s flailing emotions, more to the quivering in his voice than he’d said. But he could count on her to wait until he spoke of it himself, until he felt steadied – grounded – enough to lay it out for the team, for Jack. Once the melodrama and intensity had passed, for the moment, into Torchwood normalcy. Whatever that was.

They’d gathered in the medical bay, watching Owen work on Rhys’ shoulder; together, but worlds apart, needing to see life, survival, even love to dispel the horrors. To share in the outer edges of the couple’s happiness.

“Next time let her take the bullet,” he advised Rhys with a wry smile. This man had been hurt enough.

“Never.”

The light of devotion in Rhys’ eyes as he gazed up at Gwen’s face cut into Ianto like knives. Jack would Retcon him; he’d forget his heroism, forget about aliens and murderers and the fragility of life. But he’d never forget his soul-deep love for his woman.

Ianto helped Rhys on with his shirt, helped Owen settle his arm in the sling, escorted the two of them out through the tourist office. He took his place behind the desk, gaze unfocused.

Just what had he expected?

Had he expected Jack’s weeks’ old declaration of love, the passion in his lips, the possessiveness in his hands meant hearts and flowers and picking out dish patterns? Had he actually believed that when the captain spoke of the people he’d loved he’d been thinking of a slim Welshman in his arms and not a gap-toothed woman lying in someone else’s? What kind of a fool did that make him?

It hadn’t been Ianto Jones who’d changed Jack Harkness from a shotgun toting angel of vengeance to a compassionate man armed with a stun-gun who would talk his way out of a problem. He hadn’t demanded Jack live in the world around him instead of just treating it like a waiting room. No, Ianto shook his head, it hadn’t been him. Perhaps the Doctor had done it during those months away, perhaps his long sleep after Abaddon, perhaps it was Gwen’s influence after all. No, Ianto Jones was part of the problem, not the solution. As long as he stayed at Jack’s side, eager for attention, for any scrap of affection thrown out while the captain bided his immortal time and guarded his heart waiting for Gwen to make her choice, Jack would treat him as a stop-gap, as a way to pass the hours. A part-time shag, just as Owen had claimed all those months ago, promises of a real ‘date’ notwithstanding.

Ianto stood, stabbed at the switch, and walked quickly through the hidden door back into the hub. He had a report to make. Questions to ask. And, possibly, truths to air that had yet to see the light of day.

End Pt 1


	2. Taking the Bullet 2/4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some wounds are shallow, some deep; Ianto’s grown used to taking the bullets. But when a psychic connection with a tortured creature leaves him empty, Ianto realizes he has nothing to lose.

Jack was leaning back in his chair, his shoulders slumped, stormy eyes glued to the CCTV monitor on the shelf behind his desk. Watching Rhys and Gwen. Ianto clenched his teeth and set the bottles of water down silently. He saw the tensing of the captain’s shoulders as the couple sat in the sun, heads bent together, the breeze off the bay flinging Gwen’s dark hair across their faces. He watched Jack swipe the fingers of one hand across his lips, brow creasing. He wanted to turn and leave, storm off as if he were that romance-heroine faced with her lover’s betrayal, flouncing petticoats and heaving bosom – but dramatic scenes were more Jack’s style than his.

 

“You’re watching them.”

The captain spun to face him, caught, guilty. Then, in an instant, he turned cold, suspicious, his mercurial emotions immediately aggressive. “And you’re watching me,” he accused sharply.

Ianto nodded slowly. He didn’t deny his part in this … fiasco. He’d watched. He’d waited. He’d trusted that Jack would look at him and finally see – see Ianto. He gestured wryly towards the bottles in explanation. “Thought you might be thirsty – want to wash away the taste of ashes.” Ashes of death – of rejection.

Jack’s gaze fell to the desk, to Ianto’s gesturing hand. He frowned and rose, moving towards him. Ianto felt his brows rise but managed to hold himself still as Jack reached out and gently took his arm.

“What happened to your hand?”

The black and purple bruise crept from his wrist to swallow his thumb and strike out along the back of his hand, colors stark beneath the bright white of his rolled cuffs, the slim red lines left by the twine crisscrossing like bangle bracelets.

“Dislocated it undoing the ropes.”

Jack’s thumb traced soothing circles just above his wrist as he shifted closer, his other hand stroking along Ianto’s cheek, turning his face towards him. “You should let Owen take a look at that.”

He wanted to breathe in Jack’s scent; to put himself in the captain’s arms and find solace, to ease the emptiness the creature had left within him with the feel of warm lips, hands touching, weight pressing him down to earth – grounding him. It was easier, wasn’t it? Just to feel, to take the comfort Jack offered and leave the rest, deny the bite of his indifference, accept the frequent dismissals in order to bask in his sometimes affection? A layer of ice began to form within him, growing up layer by layer to cover over the hurt, to close off the emotions that fought for release.

Eyes locked with his, Jack slowly lifted Ianto’s wrist to his mouth, an amused grin lighting his face, and teased gentle kisses on his skin, raising gooseflesh all over Ianto’s body at the fleeting touches. He swayed, leaning closer, desperate for more. And then those bright blue eyes flicked towards the monitor, and Jack’s grip tightened just that much.

Memories burst through Ianto, searing through the ice that had frozen his will, blazing along his nerves until each cell within him was vibrating with the force of his denial, pulsing his anger out in waves.

Gwen, angry and raging after the fairies stole away their chosen one. Jack, storming the archives that night and pressing Ianto against the wall, kissing him senseless.

Jack leaving Ianto, bruised and bleeding, in the SUV out on the freezing moors so that Gwen could seek her answers from the cannibal king.

The scene in the sub-level when Jack returned to them – Jack fingering her engagement ring and then hurrying to ask Ianto out on a ‘date.’

“Being here, I've seen things I never dreamt I'd see. Loved people I never would have known if I'd just stayed where I was. And I wouldn't change that for the world.”

Those words. That kiss. It wasn’t about Ianto at all.

“Ah,” Ianto began, muscles now rigid with tension, “I see we’re at the point in this cycle where you turn to me again. Let’s see if I’ve got this right,” he continued quietly, clamping his uninjured hand hard over Jack’s to hold him in place. “Gwen smiles, you smile. She moves closer, you move away. You throw yourself at her, she turns to Rhys.” Jack gritted his teeth and tried to yank his hand away, but Ianto only held on tighter. “And then you pursue me.” He leaned in closer, eyes burning, “and I let you,” he whispered.

“Stop it,” Jack growled, finally tearing his hand away, fists clenched, red-faced with anger.

But Ianto wasn’t finished. “I let you, let you kiss me, let you lie to me that it’s me you’re seeing, me you’re wanting.” With every word he moved closer, crowding Jack backwards until the captain seethed and panted his denial, shoulders against the wall. “And we sweat and fuck until you catch a glimpse of her again, and we’re right back to the beginning.” Ianto pressed against him, groin to groin, their hot breath tangling – but they both knew this wasn’t about arousal, or sex, or want. This was rage; red, bloody rage fueled by desperation and truth and hopelessness.

Jack erupted, shoving hard, hands splayed against Ianto’s chest, catching every bruise left by the muzzle of Dale’s gun. Ianto stumbled backwards, out of reach.

“You have no right,” Jack choked out, arm extended and finger pointed like a weapon. “No right to judge me. I gave you everything I could, everything I had to give you.” He shook his head. “You sure seemed to like it at the time.”

“You … lying … bastard.” No. Not this time. “You give me _nothing_ – you’re saving it all up for a woman who you’ll never have! And the bloody truth is that you know it!”

They stared, shaking with anger, their words tearing great bleeding gashes in each other. A moment later Jack laughed, an ugly sound, arms flung out wide. “You think I have time for your tiny-minded, pedestrian, 21st century pride, Ianto Jones? Your petty jealousies?” He shoved his face forward, lips curled thin to reveal a shark’s smile. “Get over yourself.”

“Who do you think you’re fooling, Jack?” Ianto kept his voice low, controlled, but he heard the edge of bitter resentment creep in as darkness danced along the edges of his vision. “You’re sitting here, eyes glued to them, jealousy eating away at you and you pretend you’re above it all. It’s fucking pathetic.” He turned his back, too empty to fight, too exhausted to flee, and found himself staring at two startled pairs of eyes. Dizziness swept through him and he caught himself against the edge of the bookcase, chuckling silently, eyes closing in humiliation. A lovers’ spat in the workplace. Who was pathetic now?

A steady grip on his arm was all that kept him from falling down the stairs; strength and concern seemed to surround him.

“Take it easy, mate.”

Owen?

Ianto opened his eyes, frowning. Owen was braced against him on one side, holding him up, and Tosh’s slim arm wrapped around his waist on the other. He blinked, trying to clear the persistent greyness from his sight as they led him through the hub, towards the steps to the medical bay.

“No - I should –” he tried to ease away from them towards the cog door, his back itching where he felt Jack’s stare pierce him through from behind.

“Yes, yes, I’m sure you have fascinating and horribly important jobs ahead,” Owen overrode Ianto’s muttering and nudged him forward. “Sweeping up, feeding the pets, making doe eyes-”

Ianto jerked his arm from Owen’s grasp before he could finish, turning to face the smaller man, his eyes narrowed dangerously. “I’m not the one-” he growled out between clenched teeth.

“Owen!” Tosh’s voice was stern.

The doctor’s hands flew up as if in surrender. “Sorry, sorry! You’re right.” He ducked his head to one side as if in apology. “It’s not your pretty eyes that are the problem, mate. Sorry.”

“What the hell is going on around here?”

The air rustled with Jack’s arrival, stirring hurried glances and awkward movements among the three of them where they stood clustered just above the medical bay. Ianto felt his spine stiffen, unwilling to turn to see the expression on Jack’s face, watching, instead, its reflection in Owen’s, in the slight twitch of the doctor’s brows and his careful, diffident, half-lidded expression as if he hadn’t heard a word of the shouting match that had ended in Ianto’s near collapse.

“Just checking him out, nothing to worry about, I’m sure, since sudden public tantrums are quite in character for our little drama queen.”

The sarcasm rolled over Ianto, warming him, tasting of normalcy, and he followed the doctor down the steps, hearing the heavy tread behind him as Jack took his usual place along the rail. He could easily paint in the features of his captain: Distant. Aloof. Pale face empty of emotion. Standing just out of range, as if the roiling emotions couldn’t reach him up there.

Tosh stayed at Ianto’s side, her small hand touching one shoulder as if to transfer strength or sympathy. He wished he could bathe in her support the way he’d been swamped by the alien creature’s sorrow and pain earlier.

He leaned his hips against the autopsy table and then pulled away as if it burned, suddenly alert. No. He would not lie down in the spot Rhys’ had just vacated He refused to let the team make those kinds of comparisons, to draw the obvious parallels between himself and the other man. Poor, Rhys – wounded, foolish, desperately in love. No – he would not be the object of their pity. 

Owen’s cold fingers pressed into the flesh at the base of his thumb and Ianto flinched, focusing.

“Damn. What’d you do here?” the doctor muttered. He twisted the hand back and forth. “Should really have a scan to make sure it’s all back in the right place.”

“It’s fine. Just leave it.” He flexed it back and forth against the swelling, showing Owen the range of movement.

The doctor thrust out his lips and then shrugged. “Right, then. The wrists don’t look too bad. Just some brush burns by the look of it.” Owen stepped back, hands on his hips, eyes staring wryly into Ianto’s. “Let’s have the rest, then.”

Ianto didn’t let himself glance upwards. “That’s it. Just a little tired.” He started to move away when Owen thrust a hand against his right shoulder, hitting the spot where Dale had pressed the gun against his collarbone and Jack’s angry hand had been planted moments before. Ianto’s gaze never wavered, his bland, unaffected mask securely in place.

Owen held him there, obvious disbelief creasing his brow.

“Honestly,” Ianto insisted. “These butchers didn’t seem to have the access the others did to proper sports equipment.” Dark amusement swirled through him as he saw the moment Owen understood.

But still the stubborn doctor didn’t let him go – he just crossed his arms over his thin chest and planted his feet.

“Fine, so why don’t you tell me why you looked six shades paler than Rhys when we got out of there, and why you were shaking all the way back to the hub. Thought we were going to end up in the bloody bay,” he added under his breath. “You’re still looking pretty shitty to me.”

Ianto’s lips tightened. There was still time to take it all back, to feign confusion and let his outburst be forgotten, dismissed. He could blame it on the strange psychic connection, he could tell them how he’d felt its pain, had seen through its eyes, and was brought to his knees by its death. It – the alien – had reached inside Ianto and found a kindred spirit, found a loneliness and yearning that nearly matched its own. The loss of that connection had drained all of his defenses, had shut off his self-control and released all the impermeable barriers that Ianto had erected around his heart. He could do that.

He couldn’t keep himself from looking up, from seeing the curious tilt of Jack’s head and the white of his knuckles against the steel railing.

Tosh moved closer. “You should tell them, Ianto.”

“Yes, Ianto, perhaps you should ‘tell them.’” Jack echoed, his voice soft insistence laced with steel.

End Pt 2


	3. Taking the Bullet 3/4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some wounds are shallow, some deep; Ianto’s grown used to taking the bullets.  But when a psychic connection with a tortured creature leaves him empty, Ianto realizes he has nothing to lose.

 

“Couldn’t you feel it?”

The words slipped out, somehow, words he’d no intention of ever uttering.  He hated the sound of his voice: weak, hesitant, as if he was begging for them to understand, to believe him.  He hated that look in their eyes: the sad pity and condescension for poor hurt Ianto, sad little tea-boy who couldn’t be expected to cope with butchers or beatings or the truth about the bedrock of inhuman misery on which the universe was founded.  Ianto closed his eyes.  But what he hated the most was that cold dismissal written across the captain’s face; that slight narrowing of his eyes, the false calm and folded arms over his thrown-out chest that shouted his resentment so loud it should be echoing ‘round the hub.  Jack stood there above them, larger than life, looking down, outside the fears and worries of one solitary lifetime.  Judge and jury.  Would Jack even believe him?  Did it matter?  Gwen wasn’t going anywhere and Jack’s obsession with the woman wasn’t likely to, either.

 

Keeping his eyes closed like a child who thought himself invisible, Ianto steadied himself against the cold metal table, pressing hard with his sore hand so that the pain would ground him in the present.  He let the memories come – let the raw, frightened, tortured screams of the alien fill him and tried to dredge up the words, the right words, to do justice to its suffering.

 

“I don’t know when it started, exactly.  But, by the time we went into the warehouse I could feel its pain as if it were my own.  I could feel the fear, the crushing despair, the loneliness.”  He shrugged, still blind to the reactions around him.  “Its pain was all that it had.”  It was empty – after the months of torture and solitude, surrounded by beings that didn’t see it as a living soul, that just saw what it could bring them – it had given up hope for anything more, for any rescue, any real connection.

 

Words tumbled out – too many, too much truth scraping along the silent hub, re-opening wounds and bringing too much of his own dark soul to light.  “Don’t know why or how,” he smiled, forcing his eyes open to complete the distraction, but unable to focus on one face for more than an instant, “don’t know how I got so lucky.  I just know I couldn’t control it – couldn’t block it out.  And, by the end, I suppose I thought it was right, you know, that someone knew – that someone would remember – remember its pain.”

 

“You ‘felt’ it?”  Jack’s words still held that jagged edge of icy control.  Disbelief.  Jaded skepticism.  Doubt.

 

“Yep.”  Ianto countered the mistrust with defensive nonchalance.  Detachment.  As if he couldn’t care less if they believed him or not.  Maybe it was true, he frowned to himself, the colors around him leaching away to grey, resentment replaced with apathy.

 

The silent tension that rose up screamed for some release.

 

“Sorry about the fishwife screechin’ earlier,” he added after too long a moment.  “It’s just the let-down, I suppose,” Ianto admitted, shrugging.  “After feeling all that pain and confusion, the poor thing’s agony as the sedative was wearing off.”  He took a deep breath, his head felt too heavy to lift.  “Guess I overreacted.”

 

“Bullshit.”

 

Jack fired that one word out like a bullet.  Ianto’s head snapped up, anger coursing through him and then, almost instantly, draining away to leave him bereft.

 

“Jack!”  Tosh’s eyes were wide with shock.

 

Owen stepped closer to Ianto, breaking the glares the two men had locked onto one another, one hand on his shoulder as if he thought Ianto might jump up and break some of the captain’s perfect teeth.  “Harkness, you’re a right git sometimes, you know that?”  The doctor never turned but chucked the words over his shoulder, his small, dark eyes boring into Ianto’s.  “You’re sure – you’re not just, well,” he scratched nervously beside his ear, “feeling sympathetic?”

 

Ianto bit back a rude response and reached deep for even a bit of his usual dark humor.  They were right, it sounded daft.  Sounded like an excuse to spout out his own selfish rage, exclaim the despair that ate away at him.  He could still drop it – still flash a quick grin and go along with Owen’s theory, slip away to the archives insisting he was not a victim, that Jack’s rough tumbles and cold shoulders didn’t score his heart.  That his feelings hadn’t been echoed back at him by the dying alien, filling his empty soul to overflowing with desperate grief.

 

He quirked a half smile and opened a mouth filled with the dry dust of denial and subterfuge, but, oddly, it was Tosh who cut him off.

 

“You can’t just dismiss this, Ianto.  Tell them.  Tell them the rest.”

 

Her voice was soft yet strong, her gentleness a thin skin stretched over persistent, insistent, and implacable determination.  He licked his lips, uncertain, struggling to decide, his thoughts jumbled.

 

Owen’s chin jerked up, eyebrows rising.  “Go on, then.”  His hand tightened quickly on Ianto’s shoulder.  It felt like reassurance.

 

Ianto nodded, suddenly boneless, all the fight within him gone.  Fine.  “I know you touched it.  Looked into its eye.”  The memory of Jack’s strained face, hands reaching out, as seen through the creature’s strange, black and white vision returned to him.  Small figures, Jack and Tosh and Gwen.  It couldn’t tell them from the others that had chopped and sliced at it for months, kept it strapped down, poked and gouged and … and hurt it.  “I knew where you were standing, how you and Gwen stepped inside its skin, where they’d hacked it open.  How you fought to hold her back when Owen told you Rhys had been caught.”  Remembered pain throbbed behind his forehead; his skin hummed with exhaustion, his limbs trembling.  “It was so tired of being hurt.  So tired.”  The words stole out as a whisper.  He bowed his head.

 

 Owen’s grip tensed and then shifted, hands moving to his arms to ease Ianto backwards onto the table.  “Bollucks – here, give us a hand.”

 

Ianto let go, let them maneuver him as they would, felt the chill of the metal table through the silk of his waistcoat, the cotton of his shirt.  He blinked up at the cracked tile ceiling, losing himself in trying to trace the patterns there, his mind filled with the white noise of concerned voices and hurried footsteps and the clatter of Owen’s precious instruments as someone jostled the table.

 

“Ianto – Ianto!  Dammit, what the hell’s wrong with him?”

 

The voice warmed him, breath splashing against his cheek like a caress.  Strong fingers curled around his wrist, others pressed against his neck.  He blinked lazily, unconcerned.

 

“Oh, now you believe him?”

 

“Shift your arse, Jack – let me do my job!”

 

“Dammit, Owen, his eyes are open!  Ianto!”

 

“Maybe if you stopped screaming at him.”

 

Blurred features swam into view, interrupting his mesmerizing tracing of the tiny black lines against the white tiles until they disappeared again and he had to start over.

 

A sharp prick against his skin registered, making him frown.  He tried to move away from the hurt, but strong hands gripped him tightly.  A small sound escaped between his lips.  A hand soothed across his cheek, urging his head to turn, dragging his eyes away from the blank, emotionless ceramic.  Blue eyes smiled softly at him.

 

“Hey, you with me?  Hold still, Owen’s trying to draw some blood.”

 

Ianto knew him.  Knew he should feel something; that the touch, the soft words and the gentle concern should either enrage or enthrall him.  The emotions seemed to slide from his skin as if they could find no purchase, as if there was no room for them within him.  He let his eyes fall shut.

 

The hand against his cheek tapped smartly.  “Ianto.  Come on, open those beautiful blue eyes.”

 

Why? Ianto thought.  Hadn’t he seen enough?

 

“Owen, I think he’s lost consciousness.”

 

Even the growl of fear beneath that tenor voice wasn’t enough to inspire any effort.  The pressure on the skin inside his elbow fell away and the air around him swirled, fabric teasing his flesh, chasing up gooseflesh along his arm.  That would be Owen’s white coat; his quick, efficient movements within the small confines of the medical bay making it flutter and flap, almost like Jack’s.

 

Jack.  Something buried deep within his soul stirred sluggishly, awakening flickers of dark passion and heartbreaking devotion that broke the surface of Ianto’s stagnant thoughts like bubbles before they sank back down out of sight.  And he let them, never reaching out to grasp them or struggle to pull them out and look at them.  No.  That way laid madness.

 

Cool, sticky pads pressed against his brow, behind his ear, on the back of his head.  He felt tethered, tugged at, shifted.  Blips and beeps sounded loud in the tense silences between their breaths.

 

“Ianto.”

 

Owen’s voice now.

 

“Come on, mate.  I know you’re awake.  Open your eyes.”

 

“Okay, I’m taking him to the hospital.”

 

“Shut up, Jack.  I can tell by the brain wave patterns that he’s awake.  He’s just not answering.”

 

“Ianto?”

 

Tosh.  She sounded … unhappy.  Ianto tried to turn his head away from the pull of the steady, insistent hand on his face, towards her voice, his eyes blinking open when he found himself caught, powerless.

 

“There he is.”

 

Was that guilt or relief rushing out with Jack’s words to brush against his skin?  Curving the edges of Jack’s lips?

 

The hand pulled away and Owen’s fierce expression replaced the captain’s face.  “Stay with me.  Tell me how you feel,” he demanded.

 

Ianto’s tongue was thick and unresponsive, but he pushed it out of his mouth to try to wet his lips, to begin what seemed to be an awfully long process before he could speak.  Should it be this hard?

 

“Not … unconscious …”

 

“No – you’ve heard everything we’ve said, haven’t you?”

 

He widened his eyes as if that would awaken his mind – his muscles.  “Yep.”

 

Owen’s dark gaze glanced across him, towards Ianto’s right.  “I think his brain chemistry’s all fucked up – however that creature got into him, it’s buggered up the works.”

 

A snort from over the doctor’s shoulder told Ianto where the captain was standing.  “Is that your medical diagnosis?”

 

“Get stuffed,” Owen muttered, his brows rising, fingers clamped on the inside of Ianto’s wrist.  “I’m guessing if you were on the receiving end of some kind of mental or emotional stimuli, it’s overloaded your brain with noradrenaline, triggering your cortisol levels into overdrive.  If it’s been goin’ on for a longish period of time, your stress system is completely screwed.”

 

“What does that mean, Owen?”

 

Ianto managed to turn his head to bring Tosh’s concerned face into sight.  He bent his lips into a careful curve, intending to reassure, but he wasn’t quite certain he pulled it off.

 

“To put it simply, he’s gonna feel like shit for a while.  Bad, anxious thoughts, no energy, listlessness, depression.  The works.”

 

A trickle of wry amusement rose within him.  “So – no change, then?” Ianto murmured.

 

“Jack – have you ever seen this type of thing before?”  Tosh smiled down at him and Ianto felt her small hand steal into his.  “Some sort of psychic connection that didn’t originate from a particular device?”

 

Ianto’s mind churned slowly, images blurring into one another.  The Life Knife, the alien pendant Tosh’s Mary had given her, the memory device that had dredged up a little boy’s fear and a young girl’s murder.  Had he touched something down in the Archives?  Something that had opened him to the creature’s suffering?

 

The silence grew, and Ianto watched with that same strange detached serenity that had taken over his will as, first Tosh, and then Owen, turned away to face the man behind them.

 

“Jack,” Owen urged, “what do you know?”

 

The captain moved closer, expertly easing Owen out of the way.  He leaned down, slowly filling Ianto’s vision, his pale face strained, lips taut and bloodless.  Long, elegant fingers reached up to tenderly tug the leads from Ianto’s forehead, each movement slow and deliberate.  Ianto watched him as if he was on film, a thin, two-dimensional figure without weight or history.  Or emotional connection.

 

“You two should leave me alone with him.”

 

“Right,” Owen began, sarcasm stinging the air, “I’ll just go down the pub for a couple of pints while you do what exactly with my patient?”

 

Jack’s smile was cheerless and knowing, his gaze never wavering from Ianto’s.  “He’s in no danger, right?  His pulse is strong, his brain waves normal?”

 

“Well, yeah, but-”

 

“So there’s nothing for you to do, no treatment.”

 

Ianto could almost hear the doctor’s grimace.  “I’d take a sample of his saliva to make sure, give him a vitamin shot – C, B5, B12.”

 

Jack nodded.  “But it won’t cure him.”

 

“Dammit, Jack, could you just tell me what the bloody hell you intend to do for a change?”

 

“It’s okay,” Ianto said.  And, oddly, it was.  He didn’t think the lack of fear had anything to do with the weakness of his body or the confusion in his mind.  Down deep, at the bottom of his soul, without doubt and without reason, he trusted his life in Jack’s hands. 

 

“How long-” Tosh bit off her question uncertainly.

 

Jack’s hands framed Ianto’s face, thumbs stroking lightly across his cheekbones.  “Give us a few minutes.  I promise we’ll be up shortly.”

 

Footsteps receded, Owen’s grumbling following them back up into the center of the hub.

 

Ianto couldn’t look away from Jack’s eyes – his world was filled with them.

 

“Do you trust me?” the immortal man breathed against his mouth.

 

“With my life.”  He hoped he uttered the words aloud.

 

He felt Jack’s smile against his lips.  “But not with your heart.”

 

A sharp blade of sorrow pierced the muffled shroud of his emotions.

 

Jack swept forward, his mouth taking Ianto’s, hot and vital and perilous, hands holding him motionless.

 

End Pt 3/4


	4. Taking the Bullet 4/4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some wounds are shallow, some deep; Ianto’s grown used to taking the bullets.  But when a psychic connection with a tortured creature leaves him empty, Ianto realizes he has nothing to lose.

 

Light engulfed Ianto in a soft glow, stroking across his skin, slipping into his pores to fill up every crevasse of his soul with warmth and strength.  It roused his withered spirit, dispelled the shadowy weights that wrapped it round, dissolved the bonds of despair and hopelessness.  At its center, where their lips met, his and Jack’s, it didn’t taste like passion or arousal, none of the familiar stirrings of need and want.

 

But it was primal and pure and selfless.  


 

He closed his eyes, feeling the brilliance pressing against his eyelids from both sides, and he swallowed down life.

 

<<Ianto.  Ianto.>>

 

Somewhere within the glow he found himself, found the pain and the passion, the acceptance and the desire, the joy and the grief, and he took them in, each one, stacking them like blocks in his spirit, reconstructing his being.  Some had faces – his mum, Rhi, Lisa; some smelled like the dust of ancient tombs, like the sea, like coffee; some felt of the sharp metal of a gun, or the hard wood of a bat, or fine, feathery strands of hair.  And always, just there, out of the corner of his eye - Jack.

 

<<That’s it.  Slowly.  Do you feel it?>>

 

Almost done, now.  The fit was rough, teetering, just that one block missing, the head of the arch, the keystone.  Where?

 

<<I’m right here.  Come on – come and find me.>>

 

A timeless time he hesitated, unsure, the thing between them thin as gossamer or thick as steel cable; the cold blackness of space or the scorching heat of a coal fire.

 

<<You felt its pain.  You held all of its misery and loneliness within your mind.  Do you dare touch me?>>

 

Ianto reached out and found another hand reaching for his.

 

Nothing separated them now.  Ianto saw through the eyes of an immortal man, a man who laughed and cried and held a layer of lead around his heart, a layer he’d built up inch by inch with every hiss of death and every gasp of life and every year of grieving friends and enemies.  He stood within the storm of Jack’s memories, small flickers of clarity lending faces and names before stealing them back and hoarding them in tightly clasped hands.  Ianto floated for another thousand years, seeing, feeling – and then – 

 

He dug his insubstantial fingers into tiny cracks, pried apart the whitened knuckles that kept it all hidden, secret – that kept Jack Harkness alone.

 

<<No.  Not that.  Not him.  Not her.>>

 

Jack’s denial only urged Ianto on, fueling his struggles, and now it was Ianto calling out, daring, chasing Jack through the light.

 

<<Let me in.>>

 

Spears of brighter white stabbed at him, pouring out from the weaknesses in Jack’s armor.  Ianto shrugged off alien skies and landscapes, waded through pools of laughter and tears, and slipped past the frantic gropings of impossible beings until he came to the dark core of Jack’s heart. 

 

The shock of his release left him panting, the brilliance shutting down all at once, leaving him blinking the mental afterimages away.  The medical bay leaped up around him, cold and stark, metal table against his back, the faint, lingering smell of blood.  Ianto lifted his head, his shoulders, bent elbows holding his weight, and stared.

 

Jack had stumbled backward, hands going back to steady himself against the counter.  His face was even paler than before, eyes wild with panic.  “What the hell-”

 

Ianto shifted to sit at the edge of the table, the strange lethargy gone, the memories of alien wounds and ocean depths of sorrow replaced by his own pungent regrets: a hand that wasn’t held, a cold, empty bed as the dawn broke, a gaze that skimmed across his skin to seek hers.  Now, coupled with his, were Jack’s own fears, raw and trembling – fears that the time traveler had built his entire existence around, fears that kept him chasing and grasping after impossible connections when he had but to stop, to wait, just a moment, and let loving arms find him.

 

Ianto’s features settled back into their customary blandness, eyebrows raised as he carefully worked his shirt cuffs into neat folds.  His control was tentative, the box into which he’d stuffed his misery at Jack’s betrayals, his resentment at the captain’s, to all appearances, easy brush offs, was bulging at the seams, straining to hold in not only his own despair, but Jack’s centuries long dread as well.  Emotions bled from it, sending out thin strands of anger that wove in and out beneath his skin like fine copper wire at the sheer, bloody waste of it all.

 

“Just what the hell did you think you were doing?”  A remnant of Captain Harkness’ usual sharp command didn’t quite smother the apprehension beneath his words.

 

Straightening his back, Ianto lifted his gaze to pin Jack to the wall.  Jack had brought him back, infected Ianto with life.  Ianto was not about to waste it.

 

“You invited me in, Jack.  Don’t complain when you don’t like what I found.”

 

The captain jerked upright, one hand brushing through his hair, fierce blue gaze settling into an everyday sort of wariness.  “Huh, well, humans – of this century, anyway – aren’t supposed to be able to do that.”

 

“What, root around in your brain?  You started it.”

 

Jack shoved his hands up under his armpits and widened his stance, chin up.  “You’re an empath.”

 

Ianto pursed his lips, thinking, adding up the sum of his feelings.  “I was.  The creature made it so, barging in and all.  Pretty sure that bits over.”  He nodded slowly.  “Thanks for that.”

 

Jack shrugged.  “All in a day’s work.”

 

Ianto dropped to his feet, hands on his hips.  “No.”

 

A flicker of unease chased across Jack’s face.  His eyes narrowed, head turning to the side as he obviously assessed Ianto’s meaning.

 

“No?”

 

“No, Jack.  We’ll not be playing that game.”  He took a step forward, just far enough to crowd the other man.  “We can talk here, or in your office, but we will talk.”

 

“Is that right?”  Jack’s smile was dangerous, and this, Ianto knew, was not an act.

 

“Yep.  That’s the cost, Jack.  The cost of all this,” Ianto flipped his hands up at his sides as if weighing the misery of the past day.  “Words.  Truth.”

 

Jack’s breathing sped, his head shaking back and forth.  “You don’t know what you’re asking,” he whispered.

 

A dark smile slipped out from behind Ianto’s control.  “Don’t I though?”

 

He followed the tight, angry shoulders of his captain through the hub, muttering a few words of comfort and reassurance to Tosh and letting Jack stare Owen back into his chair when he wasn’t more than halfway out of it.

 

“Great.  Hysterics, round two,” he heard the doctor mutter as he passed by.

 

Jack grabbed one of the sweating water bottles as he brushed past his desk, twisting the lid ineffectually back and forth as he paced.  Ianto moved more carefully, letting the water glide down his parched throat.

 

“To start,” Ianto paused, hoping that Jack would settle somewhere, or at least look at him, but beyond a few furious glances thrown in his direction, Jack seemed to be pretending Ianto wasn’t there.  “Why didn’t you believe me – about the creature?”

 

That touched a nerve and Jack spun, pointing the water bottle like a gun at Ianto’s chest.  “That’s not what … it isn’t that …”

 

“Oh.”  Realization hit Ianto low in the gut.  “You,” he swallowed painfully, “you didn’t want to believe it.”

 

Jack shifted closer, gaze locked to his, and Ianto saw the hurt, the woundedness in their depths.  “I didn’t want you to –“

 

“- you didn’t want me to know how you felt,” he finished for the struggling immortal.  The struggling, completely idiotic immortal.  “You are a selfish bastard Jack Harkness,” he chuckled, snorting at the surprising warmth that suddenly filled him.

 

Jack’s teeth were clenched around his words.  “I never wanted to hurt you, Ianto.”

 

“No?  How about Gwen, then.  Or Rhys?”  He stepped in, hip to hip, until the bottle pressed hard against his chest, just over his heart.  “Do you plan to go on like this?” his low-pitched voice rumbled between them, “pretending there’s no more to you than the over-sexed toddler shouting, ‘mine, mine, mine’ as he rummages ‘round his toys?  Playing the heart-broken hero with longing glances towards the untouchable woman of his dreams as he settles for the doting cabin-boy?”  He spread his hand over Jack’s chest, seeming to hold the man close with the intensity, the powerful heat of their connection.  “You forget, I’ve seen your heart, Jack.  And I know.”  

 

It was Jack’s turn to close his eyes, to try to drift into the very air around him and disappear.  “No.  You’re fooling yourself.  You don’t –”

 

Ianto smiled, leaning in, cheek to cheek, to breathe across Jack’s ear.  “I know I love you.  And I know that scares the shit out of you.”

 

He moved away gracefully, just as the alarm began to blare, just as the cog door began its grinding movement.  Gwen’s hurried footsteps on the stairs brought Jack to the door, his face composed into a chilly mask.

 

It only made Gwen’s fury seem hotter, her self-loathing steeped deeply in guilt and shame slamming into them full force.  “I’m not doin’ it.  I won’t drug him.”  She brushed off Tosh and Owen’s – and Ianto’s - words and stood toe to toe with the reason for her rampaging emotions.

 

Ianto heard the denial in her raging shouts, watched the self-reproach in the clenched fists she beat against her own chest.  God, she was trying to back away, to snap this bond between her and Jack – didn’t he see?  She was trying to choose, once and for all – she was trying to convince herself to choose Rhys – a good man, a brave man, a man who truly loved her and always would.

 

He caught the bottle Jack threw at him, watching over the captain’s shoulder as he walked towards her, and Ianto waited, wondering if Jack would do the right thing.  Finally.  If he’d admit – if only to himself – that it wasn’t Gwen he longed for.

 

“Do you really think you could go back to your old life before Torchwood?”

 

Of course, that was the question, wasn’t it?

 

“I wouldn’t know anything different.”

 

“I would.”

 

Ah, Jack, Ianto sighed, head bowed.  It wasn’t lust for her body or the wish for a declaration of love that put the tremble in his voice.  It wasn’t big brown eyes or female bits that kept him on edge, jealous, craving.  No, it was fear.  Fear of what Captain Jack Harkness, former time agent, alien, tortured and resurrected soul could never have.  The cost of a life lived over centuries among beings who flashed brightly by like signposts along the road.

 

What he wanted most of all – what he’d left them to chase after – what he couldn’t let go of even now, with truth and love and Ianto waiting at his back.  Jack wanted the scrapbook perfection of ‘a normal life.’  Whatever the hell that was.

 

No matter that he bragged of tentacled lovers and sleepin’ his way across the galaxies and shallow intimacies that never reached his heart, Jack Harkness’ dreams weren’t like a Welsh boy’s childhood hopes of adventure and travel and heroism.  No, he’d had all that, hadn’t he?  No, Jack wanted to live in a happy family snapshot.  He wanted predictable and steady, kids at his knees, nights playing darts with the boys down the pub; mortgages and trips to the Tesco and taxes and aching joints and grey at the temples.  Grandkiddies on the weekends and aging and the certainty of death all wrapped up in the only ‘normal’ couple he could see: Rhys and Gwen.

 

And while he was looking for that, gazing off into the distance longing for family, Jack would burn the only bridges that he hadn’t crossed; he’d turn his back on the reality of Ianto’s love, his promise of devotion for as much of a lifetime as he was allowed; the only lifetime Ianto would ever have.

 

Ianto had only the one to get it right, after all.

 

But Jack said, “Give Rhys my love and I will see you tomorrow.”  And Ianto didn’t know what that meant.

 

When she left, Jack grabbed the water out of his hand and flung himself back into his chair, eyes glued to the CCTV monitor, still watching the couple kiss and walk off into the sunset.  Ianto rubbed one hand down the back of his neck, intending to leave, meaning to walk away without another word wasted, and let the man pout and sulk and imagine ‘what might have been.’

 

He never intended to speak.

 

“I could do that, take one of the blokes at the coffee shop up on his not so subtle offers.  I could bring him home – he’d probably stay the night, want to hold onto me a little longer than it took to bring him off.  Maybe in a month or so he’d want to move in, leave a toothbrush, change of pants.”  Ianto leaned against the frame of the door, gaze distant, unfocused, as if he could see this future he’d painted in his mind.

 

“He wouldn’t smell like you – no 51st century pheromones.  I couldn’t talk about Myfanwy’s eating habits or that it was Weevil slobber that soaked my clothes, or why I had to run out at all hours, coming home battered and bloody.  But it would be all right.  He’d take me to the movies, hold my hand in the dark.”

 

He felt the warmth at his back before Jack’s hands slipped across his shoulders, down his arms, barely touching.

 

“But he’d be second best,” Ianto kept on.  “And, somehow, sometime, I’d let something slip – a word, a smile – just like you do, Jack.  I’d be thinking of you and he’d know it, just like I know, Jack.  He’d know it wasn’t love, that my heart would never belong to him.”  Ianto turned into the circle of Jack’s arms.  “And it wouldn’t be enough.”  He brought his hands up behind Jack’s neck, leaned in, foreheads touching, and swallowed the tears.  “And he’d leave me.”

 

“No, no,” Jack murmured, kisses raining on Ianto’s eyes, at the corners of his mouth, down his throat, hands splayed against his back, holding on, holding tight.  “No, don’t leave me, Ianto.  Don’t leave me.”

 

Ianto felt the shaking; the wetness on his cheeks, and wondered which of them was crying.  He held on, unable to move away.

 

“I’m sorry, so sorry,” Jack breathed into his hair.  “I’m a fool.  Not good, not good enough.  Never worth your pain, I know that.”  Lips darted in to taste his, lingered, saying more than the words.  “You’ll never be second best.  Never.”

 

And Jack went home with Ianto.  Undressed him slowly with reverent hands, promised better, choked out regrets against the skin of Ianto’s belly.  In the dark between dusk and dawn Ianto reached out and he was there, warm and lithe and there.  And it was a beginning.

 

In the end, the stars fall into place sometimes.  There is loss and gain and heartache and joy.  And, sometimes, second best is good enough.  And sometimes, it’s more – so much more.

 

End.


End file.
